aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 6, 2011 - 9:06am

The reason I am creating a new thread is because the other one got really long and it seems more people are interested and I don't want them to feel like they have to read through 173 comments to know about the anthology. Here we go.....

PSYCHOSIS Anthology--working title--still open to submissions

It's based on mental disorders told from a medically accurate perspective so it needs to be researched. Your story can be about anything as long as the main character is the one with the mental illness. I have a master list of who is writing which disorder, I may open a new thread inviting more people to write for it because it seems like more new people are joining the site. I would like a rough draft by January 10th but if you need longer, let me know. I am making the final deadline February 15th. It's unpaid for now but we are going to shop it around and if it sells well, everyone will get royalties, everyone who gets published in it is guaranteed a copy of the book and can use it as a professional writing credit. Stories can be anywhere from 2500-5000 words or longer if they are exceptional. Feel free to put your rough draft in the writer’s workshop so we can give our feedback as a community and help you polish it. 24 stories will be chosen.

Everyone who has expressed interest in writing a story, please let me know your progress and if you are still interested and committed to your disorder because other people are asking me if certain ones are taken. I'd like to avoid repeats if we can. If you can copy and paste the master list and put what your disorder is next to your name please..........

R.Moon
from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's DigestDecember 6, 2011 - 9:18am

ALien: I may have to gracefully bow out. Man, I just cannot come up with anything half decent for this. My mind just isn't in it. I started working on my novel again because it's been gnawing at the back of my brain and if I don't do something about it, I might miss some things then kick myself later. But, I'd still like to be a part of this in some way. However I can help, I'm in.

aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 6, 2011 - 9:38am

I understand. Hmmm, I might steal Cotard's syndrome then, if you don't mind.

R.Moon
from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's DigestDecember 6, 2011 - 10:01am

I will still be trying to get a story in for this. Progress has been slow but I shall try my best to get it ready in time. Up to my waist in half finished projects at the moment, and I start back at work tomorrow. When I do get writing time I'll try to make this my priority because I really like the idea of the project.

Fingers crossed.

David Shepherd
from shepherdsville, KY is reading Idoru by William GibbsonDecember 6, 2011 - 7:54pm

I'll do anti social personality for you. Try to bring something new to the table other than a serial killer story.

Haha, oh...David, that is pretty much exactly what I said in the earlier thread. This new thread is a little confusing.

David Shepherd
from shepherdsville, KY is reading Idoru by William GibbsonDecember 6, 2011 - 8:37pm

Well it sounds like you had it planned before me so I'll find something else, The old thread was to long for me to care to read with this short one here haha. Well than I guess I'll have to with genital retraction syndrome. Amazing all the stories that come to mind with mental illness.

Hopefully the draft I am working on is at least AS good as yours would have been.

Is genital retraction syndrome a mental illness? I would have thought it was physical. Hm.

David Shepherd
from shepherdsville, KY is reading Idoru by William GibbsonDecember 6, 2011 - 9:24pm

It's mostly with Chinese that believe their genitals are shrinking despite proof that their not and that they'll eventually disappear killing them. I'm glad I'm doing this though because what I'm doing now is much better than my sociopath idea was. I was feeling uninspired for the sociopath thing so I guess I should thank you.

aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 6, 2011 - 9:27pm

Well, I created the new thread because of the new people coming in and it seemed like the old one was getting way too long and people were getting confused.

So far all the stories I'm expecting have a somber tone, imagine the fun you could have with a narcissitic personality. I picture the kind of woman who puts her daughter in beauty pageants and wears too much lipstick, when she goes to a funeral she talks crap about the corpse, a person who no matter what happens to others, she makes it about her. Her husband has a heart attack and she is mad that he made her leave work early.

David Shepherd
from shepherdsville, KY is reading Idoru by William GibbsonDecember 6, 2011 - 9:40pm

Don't worry I have quite a light tone about the penis shrinkage, not something that would work as a serious story I think. And yes it's a mental disorder, their genitals never actually move. I'm still trying to find out why they believe they are though. I considered narcissism but I just couldn't feel it.

Limbless K9
from Oregon is reading WraeththuDecember 6, 2011 - 9:40pm

Please don't think Stockholm can't be written about. My story isn't coming along so anybody wanting to write about it is welcome to!

David Shepherd
from shepherdsville, KY is reading Idoru by William GibbsonDecember 6, 2011 - 9:43pm

@limbless I've always thought it would be funny for a hostage to rape their captor. You could make it an over exaggerated story, like the person carves a ring out of their food bowl and proposes to the captor.

Limbless K9
from Oregon is reading WraeththuDecember 7, 2011 - 7:42am

@David That is an awesome idea. Reverse rape. Hah. That isn't something you hear about often. Love it.

aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 7, 2011 - 8:18am

@David--the penis shrinkage could all be in his head. His paranoia that everyone else is huge down there but him and when his gf becomes friends with a black guy, he has a psychotic break lol

My professor friend just sent me a study I had asked for. I might rewrite the whole thing now. This study would make a great story in itself--a pyschologist working with sociopaths at a prison realizes that his housemate is actually a sociopath, and studies him until he borrows $300 and disappears one day <--that's from the abstract, i kid you not.

David Shepherd
from shepherdsville, KY is reading Idoru by William GibbsonDecember 7, 2011 - 2:22pm

@Alien That would be cool for what im doing because the charater constantly pulling on his penis and staying up all night to study his penis is freaking out his girlfriend. A symptom of the problem is impotency to. Im having the most fun with writing about him at work though.

Ah, I misread the abstract when I found it a few days ago, he borrowed $300 and never returned IT, not never returned.

Brian Ingham
from Stillwater Oklahoma is reading There is No Year by. Blake ButlerDecember 7, 2011 - 7:15pm

Sign me up for hybristophilia if thats still open. I can knock out a rough draft here in the next 2 weeks tops. I may even try to do one for Pica if that hasnt already been taken yet..

aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 8, 2011 - 3:42am

I believe someone took hybristophilia. We still need pica though.

Brian Ingham
from Stillwater Oklahoma is reading There is No Year by. Blake ButlerDecember 8, 2011 - 4:22am

hmm...the list says that pica is taken and hybristophilia isnt? Oh well, i might toy around with both of them, it'll give me something to focus on instead of pulling my hair out over my other projects.

@limbless...are you giving up on stockholm? because if my other two choices are for sure taken, i might take a crack at this one.

Richard
from St. Louis is reading various anthologiesDecember 9, 2011 - 2:25pm

looks like i'll try to contribute something to this. should be an interesting collection.

Wait. Wait, wait, wait. Is that Richard Thomas up there saying he's going to submit something? Damn. Now, I just may have to get my ass in gear and write something. He's got a sizable cover letter and is a damn good writer to boot. Some more writers like that will help pitch something this dark to a publisher.

I would love to write a story for this on Schizophasia, but unfortunately I'm not confused enough in life at this point. I wish you all the best with the project, i've been stalking it since day one, but cannot come up with a good enough plot that would make sense in word salad.

aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 9, 2011 - 11:42pm

The deadline isn't Dec. 12th, I was saying that I would like people to send me some rough drafts or try to show me some stuff by Dec. 15th but I was willing to extend it to Dec. 30th because I know everyone is busy celebrating Hannukah and Xmas and Joseph Smith Day. I just want to know how everyone is doing on their story because a few people dropped out. I'm actually extending the final deadline to Jan. 30th, 2012 because I want more contributers. Caleb J. Ross just told me he would write something for the anthology too.

@Nathan--pyromania is a go.

@Ryan--I'm going to punch you in the face lol Now you want to submit something because someone you like is on board. Thanks for the vote of confidence ;p. I told you I wanted the necrophilia story from you. I've even extended the deadline so please consider submitting something.

Danny, I know I said I'd have something for you today, but I got a burst of inspiration and tore the whole thing down to start over, I'm close to 1k in right now, but I think I need to get at least a couple more pages done before it's worth having you look at. So...maybe tomorrow evening I can shoot you over what I've got so far. At least, right now, I am grooving with it, where when we spoke last night I was feeling pretty defeated.

Sorry, don't know where I got Dec 12! Oh I know, that's the deadline for the voting on Thunderdome. Thanks for extending it to the 30th! If I submit, I'd like to do a good job.

Chester Pane
from Portland, Oregon is reading The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot DiazDecember 10, 2011 - 12:34pm

I am working on my Dendrophilia piece. I have a rough draft I'm going through a few more times before submitting it to the workshop for some peer review and more revisions and re-submitting and more revisions and re-submitting.

I don't want to send you a piece of shit Danny, so I hope it's alright if I use December to get the piece in shape so then it can be edited...

Also, in my opinion it might be good to let this thing simmer so more writers will consider jumping on board?

Aha - if we are aiming for the 30th then I am more confident of getting a decent draft together.

I've been having issues with this story. I must have canned more than three thousand words that I wasn't happy with. I have an outline but bringing it to life is proving tough.

Made a fresh start this morning though. Fingers crossed I'll crack it this time.

aliensoul77
from a cold distant star is reading the writing on the wall.December 10, 2011 - 3:21pm

I am willing to let it simmer as long as we need to because Chester's right, we want quality work to blow someone's socks off. I'm reworking my story as well so take your time, litreactors. We might still need more people to jump on the bandwagon because quite a few people on the master list I'm unsure if they are still working on it because it's been awhile. Mostly the peeps towards the bottom with question marks, not you, Renee.

It doesn't seem like anyone else is using any delusional disorders, if so please correct me. I only mention this because I've basically torn apart what I originally had because I've had a bit of inspiration.

Okay, I'd love to attempt this. I have a plot in mind but not a specific disorder. Sadly, the one my character would probably slip into (antisocial) has already been taken. Does the story have to specifically be about a disorder and does the character have to discover that they have said disorder, or can it be vague? For example, the character is presented as clearly having some sort of psychosis but its up for the reader to figure it out. At the very least I could probably throw in some pathologial lying in there.

I suppose regardless I could still write the story anyway. If it doesn't make it into the book then I can always put it elsewhere.